Spotlight
Summer 2007 Back to Spotlight home page
Envision tomorrow
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I. Celebrating ESU’s new architect, new blueprint
II. Remodeling ESU’s student body
III. Drawing a vision for tomorrow
Celebrating ESU's new architect, blueprint
As silly as the word first sounds, the festiveness of “Inaugapalooza” aptly describes not only the student-led carnival to celebrate President Michael R. Lane’s inauguration in late March, but the entire week of events. It was a celebration of Emporia State University in all its variety, diversity and richness, and a welcoming of the university’s 15th president, a man as equally at ease laughing as he is leading.
That unique mixture surfaced on campus throughout the week. Where else would you see college women wearing fake mustaches to match a president’s upper lip? Where else would a Saudi Arabian student in traditional garb ride a mechanical bull? At the same time, the tone was serious. Panel discussions were hosted on the future of ESU, and on the benefits of studying abroad. In open houses in each school, faculty, staff and students showcased themselves to the campus and community. In his inaugural address, Lane challenged each of ESU’s constituent groups, from alumni and friends to faculty and staff, to meet the demands of tomorrow’s ESU. In words and actions, Lane is ready to lead. At a luncheon preceding the inaugural ceremony on March 31, the remarks drew to a close without an invitation for the crowd to be dismissed. A pregnant pause ensued as no one in the large Webb Lecture Hall crowd wanted to be the first to stand – until Lane himself made the definitive move. The rest of the guests followed suit.
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The pomp and circumstance of installing a new president was there, albeit without the weather’s cooperation. A sunny morning with temperatures in the sixties gave way to clouds and blustery, cold wind just in time for the 1:45 p.m. processional, when a parade of faculty, staff and students – international students representing each country in the student body – shivered their way from the Memorial Union to Roosevelt Hall and then back north to Plumb Hall. As faculty members waited outside to enter Albert Taylor Hall, the wind whipped their black robes. Photographers had to switch from the west to the east side of the faculty to see their faces, because the entire group had turned their backs against the wind. “I wish I would’ve worn my long underwear,” said one.
Inside, there was the warmth of music, the
encouragement of various speakers, and humility. “This
celebration is about this university,” Lane said. “It’s not
about me.” Indeed, as Foundation Board of Trustees Chairman
Tim Clothier said, “An organization is only as good as the
people that make it up. Mike Lane is a leader who gathers
the insight and input of the people and crafts an action
plan.”
That action plan is on the backs of all those who are
vested in Emporia State University. Lane carefully laid
out opportunities for each of those groups, beginning with
faculty. Among his experiences at eight different schools,
the dedication of ESU faculty to students is the greatest “that I have ever seen, anywhere” – high enough to accommodate growing public and legislative demands for
assessment and accountability in the outcomes of student
learning, and high enough to develop the faculty’s critical
role in student recruitment and retention, Lane said.
Speaking to the staff, Lane praised the level of
commitment to students, crediting it with improving
retention among first-year students. To community
members, he asked that they treat ESU students as “your own,” and pledged continued engagement and
assistance in economic development. To Foundation and
Alumni Association board members, Lane asked that they
advocate for ESU in their communities, steering students
and potential supporters to ESU.
To students, he related how the Cold War threat of
Russia subsided, revealing that the Russian people “are
people very much like us with similar dreams, ambitions,
and desires…. The time is rapidly approaching when an ESU graduate will have the opportunity to visit Baghdad
or Tehran to form professional partnerships,” Lane said.
“The world will continue to change and the opportunities
you have here at ESU can help prepare you for those lifechanging
opportunities, if you take advantage of them.
Take a chance! The 137 Chinese students studying on our
campus have – why not you?”
Lane also outlined the need to identify and attract
significant resources in order to achieve greatness
as a regional university: endowments for faculty
professorships and chairs; endowments for international
travel for students and faculty; support for continuing
development of faculty and staff; and scholarships. Along
the way, Lane promises thorough planning. The promise
of a more perfect education is a moving target, as he noted
in the words of University of Texas at Austin professor
Joseph Lagowski: “We are attempting to educate and
prepare students (hire people in the workforce) today
so that they are ready to solve future problems, not yet
identified, using technologies not yet invented, based on
scientific knowledge not yet discovered.”
A mighty task, for sure, but ESU is up to the task. Lane
inherited a solid foundation of measured growth from
his predecessor, former President Kay Schallenkamp,
and now it is his turn. When Kansas Board of Regents Chairman Nelson Galle inadvertently skipped over the
A Cappella Choir’s closing performance at the ceremony,
Lane reminded him. “I knew somewhere I’d miss something,” Galle said,
laughing. “That’s what he’s here for. To take charge.”
Remodeling ESU’s student body
For evidence of shifting demographics in the Emporia State student body, one can look right down Main Street of the Memorial Union. You may see Nayaf Alluhaiden, 20, from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, talking on his cell phone and drinking a Mountain Dew. Or you may see any one of the 137 Chinese students who studied at ESU in the last academic year.
Forty foreign countries are represented among ESU
students, and that’s not the only shift. Women outnumber
men nearly two to one in the student population, and
what seems to be a much wider disparity in leadership
positions. And enrollment growth isn’t projected to
come from the traditional high school graduates, but
from distance education. At a time when the university’s
leadership changes hands, it can be instructive to look at
the numbers and ponder what’s next.
Alluhaiden applied for a Saudi Arabian government
scholarship to study in the United States, sending
his credentials to the country’s Cultural Mission in
Washington, D.C. His concept of America included New
York City, Washington, D.C., Hollywood, and Disneyland.
The mission recommended Emporia State, in part for its
computer information systems program. “It’s a small
college town and for your major, it’s good,” Nayaf recalls
hearing. “I said, ‘OK, I’ll go to Emporia.’ I was excited,
nervous, all at the same time, and I was afraid.
At first, he was alone. He came in 2005, the first Saudi
to arrive at ESU in a new wave of Saudis studying in the
States. In the 1970s, in particular, Saudis came to America
for higher education. The stream stopped in the 1990s,
but today’s resurgence is because the earlier generation’s
Saudi graduates, convinced that America is a good place,
are in a position to ensure their country’s brightest have an
opportunity for an American education, said Jim Harter,
assistant vice president for international education.
So Alluhaiden is no longer alone. In the last year, 38 Saudis were enrolled at ESU. Post-Sept. 11, the international student count at ESU dwindled to around 150, but by this spring it had rebounded to 343 students from 40 countries. The end result is vigorous cultural exchange. “I think that’s the key to a better understanding – not just tomorrow, but this is for generations to come," Harter said. The pool of homegrown students is also
undergoing dramatic change. While the
number of high school graduates in Kansas is
holding steady and even projected to increase
slightly, officials are keeping an eye on a
growing multiculturalism in younger grades.
Through outreach, they’re looking for ways to
ensure that students are offered the college
preparatory requirements and view higher
education as achievable. “The market share
of the Kansas student is becoming tighter and
tighter,” said Dr. Jim Williams, vice president
of student affairs.
Another curious national trend hitting
Emporia State is a growing imbalance between
male and female students. From time to time,
one can hear alarmist underclassmen telling
each other that the ratio is 6-to-1, but it’s not.
Fall 2006 data shows 64 percent women, 36
percent men. Still, the ESU female population
grew at a faster clip from 2000 to 2005, and an
anecdotal glance at top students shows a dearth
of male leaders. Ten of the 15 prestigious Shepherd Scholars for 2007-
08 are women. Of the Ambassadors for next year, 24
of the 33 Ambassadors are women. All but two of the
17 nominees for the 2007 Newberg Outstanding Senior
award were women.
“It’s hard not to notice,” said Drew Donahoo, a senior
from Overland Park and Ambassadors chairman for the
2007-08 year. But he hasn’t given it too much thought,
because his activities seem fairly balanced – three men
serve on the Ambassadors’ executive board, and in the
theatre department, plenty are involved.
However, he gives tours to prospective students as an
Ambassador. “I have noticed on tours, I very rarely give
high school tours to guys. It’s always the ladies,” Donahoo
says. The guys, it seems, are “there to miss school.”
As for the leadership roles, Donahoo wondered if
women are more likely to take advantage of opportunities. “I think they’re probably more motivated,” he said. “It
seems like there are more women in leadership roles on
campus. It seems like they try harder.”
It’s as if the tables have turned in a single generation,
and women are no longer the non-traditional college
students. Dr. Williams, in student affairs, says it’s not a
threat to higher education, but the field is certainly asking
questions: “It’s different if there’s a huge population shift
and the male species is dying out. The bigger question is, ‘Why aren’t men going to college?’”
A predominant answer, currently, is the concept of
immediate earnings. A male graduating from high school
may be drawn to a technical profession’s annual wage of
$30,000, without considering that the lack of a college
degree will cap his salary a few years down the road.
Whatever the explanation, women today are earning
degrees at a higher rate.
The key for a university is to prepare for when, and
if, men seek to correct the balance. “That population
may not come back to the brick-and-mortar programs,”
Williams said. “It may be in distance education, and we’ll
be prepared. We want to recruit and retain the traditional
age while making higher education an opportunity for
all.”
Nayaf Alluhaiden is grasping the opportunities. He
hopes to finish his bachelor’s degree in 2009 or 2010, and
then begin the MBA program. His father works in real
estate in Riyadh and plans to open his own business, which
the son might manage. But first things first. Alluhaiden has
returned to Riyadh this summer to marry a young woman
he’s known since childhood, and bring her to Emporia
in the fall. He wants his wife to earn a college degree so
they’re on equal intellectual footing: “If you want to build
something, you have to build a foundation,” he said.
Drawing a vision for tomorrow
The foundation of Emporia State University has been under construction for 144 years and counting, from the first days when Lyman Beecher Kellogg traveled by horse and wagon to Emporia in 1863, to the creation of the ESU Foundation in 1952, to the newest installation of leadership.
The foundation is stable. Completion of the campaign for student scholarships, Building Blocks
for Success, is anticipated this fall, adding a feather to
ESU’s cap. But there is room
for growth, or rather, an imperative need for it. Leaders
are now crafting a more robust, comprehensive approach
to supporting the ESU of tomorrow.
One of President Michael Lane’s boldest moves at the inauguration was to name where these opportunities lie. The university’s blueprint for the future will draw upon endowed professorships, naming opportunities, international travel for faculty and students, professional development for faculty and staff, and scholarships. “We have to think big. It’s time for ESU to think big,” Lane said. “There are a lot of things we want to accomplish as an institution that we won’t be able to accomplish unless we think big.”
Endowed funds
Endowed funds for the top teachers can be created in
two ways. One is to reward exceptional performers on
campus with additional salary and stipends for travel
and research, enhancing their ability to excel. The other
is to entice prospective faculty members with salary and
research support. The talent pool for faculty is decreasing,
Lane said, because fewer doctorates are being awarded in
certain disciplines, and because of corporate hiring. The
market for faculty is a national market, and ESU must
compete on this scale when its average salaries are below
the state, regional and national averages.
Emporia State currently has a handful of endowed funds for the benefit of professors: the Jones Distinguished Professor (School of Business), the Jones Professorship for the Advancement of Teaching, the Richel Professorship for the Advancement of Teaching (School of Library and Information Management), the Glaser Distinguished Professorship for Engraving Arts, the Dr. Herman Baehr Endowed Chair in Finance, and the Jones Institute for Educational Excellence Fund.
Each endowment pays serious dividends. The Baehr
Endowed Chair in Finance has been filled for just one year,
and students are already scoring higher on the finance
section of the standardized test given to all graduating
business majors, said Dr. Robert Hite, dean of the School
of Business.
The endowment allowed the school to lure Dr. Barry
Smith from New Mexico State University to serve as ESU’s
finance chair. “It allows us to be competitive in the marketplace.
Industry salaries in finance and accounting are among the
highest in all disciplines,” Hite said. “It’s enabled us to
hire someone from a D-I school who held a similar chair.
It bolsters our school, and it bolsters our students.”
The renewed credibility in finance has led the school to file paperwork to reinstate the finance major, which was dropped about five years ago. The major will improve on what now is a finance concentration, better preparing students to be investment managers, stockbrokers, bankers and insurance professionals, Hite said.
Naming opportunities
The School of Business, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the School of Library and Information Management, and the Teachers College all require greater support. “All four schools should carry names,” Lane said. Within the schools, donors might choose to support an academic program or a building. The result is much more than a name on a plaque. The gifts can be spread across the school’s mission statement, funding an endowed chair and endowed research center, supporting scholarhips and an “excellence fund” for the dean to use where he or she sees fit.
Professional development
There is a link between educated faculty and staff and
excellent student education, Lane said. “If we want to
provide our students with the highest level of education,
we have to keep our faculty and staff educated.” Faculty
members position themselves at the forefront of their
respective fields by traveling to conferences to defend
research before their peers. On campus, faculty members
must be continually acclimated to online teaching tools.
Staff members must be trained. Those implementing the
Banner software system must make the system work as a
strategic tool. From customer service to managing the new
artificial turf at Welch Stadium, professional development
is a key component of delivering education.
Scholarships
The beauty of scholarships is in their flexibility. President Lane and Dr. Peggy Lane have a passion for the impact of international travel on students’ minds, and they’ve established a scholarship that will bring together a small group of student leaders as freshmen, traveling with them and training them in leadership. Paula Sauder, who has seen the challenges a single parent endures to earn a college degree, donated nearly half a million dollars for single parents studying at ESU. In every one of ESU’s hundreds of endowed scholarships, the donor’s wishes craft the scholarship’s purpose.
International travel
A growing number of international students are studying at ESU, but the president wants to see more ESU students studying abroad. Additional funding was already allocated to support student travel this summer, and he’s asked the admissions office to stress to incoming students the possibility of studying abroad. Read about the experience of one student, Ryan Diehl.
The blueprint
In the initial stages of drawing the blueprint of
tomorrow, Lane acknowledged that a challenge is to reach
the thousands of alumni whose only contact with ESU is
the Spotlight in their mailboxes. Reconnecting with a
base of alumni and friends numbering more than 50,000
will take broad support, starting with groups such as the
president’s community advisory council. Lane formed the
council after his arrival to consider what’s working and
what’s not. The outreach has just begun, Lane said. “It’s
going to take a lot of hard work by a lot of people – there’s
no way around it,” he said.
We welcome your thoughts on the future of ESU, and
how we can reconnect with you. Send us your thoughts
with an “E-Wire” letter to the editor, and at President Lane’s request,
we’ll see that he gets a copy.
Last Updated April 17, 2008